Trust
by clair beaubien
Summary: Ch 3 now up. Tag to 4.22. Sam tries to tell Dean he was wrong when he said Dean never trusted him.
1. Dean's POV

"I'm done with it." I tell Sam and that has to be the biggest lie I've told him yet. I'm _so_ far away from done with 'it', done with him, that I'm on the other side of the world from 'done with it'.

SPN SPN SPN

"Bobby – Bobby, we've got – I've got – uh – there's a _situation_. With Sam."

We're at a crappy gas station in a one-crappy-gas-station town. Sam's gone into the bathroom to wash the blood off of himself I expect. We haven't talked about it. We haven't said anything. I'm not _going_ to say anything if I can reasonably help it or I might just strangle on all the words twisting around inside of me.

"Sam? What's going on?" Bobby asks. "It's not his arms is it? I thought they were all healed up."

"No, not his arms. He's – he was -." And for all the really weird impossible things I've ever had to say in my life, I never thought I'd ever be saying this. "He's been drinking demon blood."

"_What?_" The shock in Bobby's voice matches the shock I felt in my gut when I realized.

"That's how he's had the power to kill demons. It's that bitch Ruby. She's -." _She's dead,_ I thought to myself. "She got him addicted to it somehow."

For a second I think I see the knob on the bathroom door turn and I panick, but the door doesn't open.

"Look Bobby – I don't have much time. Sam's in the head. How do I help him? How do we – how do I _help_ him?"

"Get him to my place. We'll take care of it."

Bobby sounds so sure and so no nonsense I'm almost dizzy from relief.

_We'll take care of it. We can help Sam._

"How? How do I get him there without making him suspicious? I don't want to spook him, I don't want to tip him off."

"Leave that to me then Dean. I got a few things to take care of. I'll call as soon as I'm set. Just keep Sam with you and in the dark."

"All right."

And we hang up and I'm curious what Bobby has in mind but I stash my phone and get back in the car and wait for Sam. He's back in another minute and we get back on the road and it's a quiet drive for a long time.

SPN SPN SPN

Sammy still exists. My little brother is still alive inside the hard shell of who – what – he had to become when I was in hell. I know because he still trusts me, and this Sam, this hard, driven man, would never trust me if Sammy wasn't there somewhere. He trusts me enough to believe my silence in the car, to believe my lie '_I'm done with it.'_ when he wants to fight_._ He follows me in his usual spot, just behind me, into Bobby's house, into Bobby's cellar, and he trusts me enough to not suspect a thing when I let him walk first into Bobby's panic room. And it breaks my heart that he trusts me enough to be surprised when Bobby shuts the door on him. And it breaks my heart when he calls out my name from behind that door, the way he used to when he was scared or in trouble or both. He trusts me enough to believe I'll save him, I'll protect him.

Please just trust me until we can open that door again.

The End.


	2. Bobby's POV

That kid can break my heart.

Even when Sam was going through his '6 inches overnight' growth spurts, he never had what you'd call 'awkward moments', not physically anyway. Probably on account of all the self-defense training they went through, Sam always had a good idea of his body in space. You could never say he didn't know his own strength - he did. Down to the pounds per square inch probably.

_Now _though, now he _don't_ know his strength, or his weakness, or his arm from his ass. Addiction does that to a person, whether it's drugs, booze, or demon blood. Addiction, part of it anyway, is lying to everybody you have to, yourself most of all.

Still - still, even at what _should_ be the lowest point of his life right now, still Sam shows up on my door step looking just the same as usual, a little tired maybe, or maybe I'm looking harder for something out of place.

He's standing behind Dean like always, and - because he don't know that I know - Sam gives me a look, apologizing in advance for the crappy mood Dean's in.

"So - we're here. What?" Dean snaps. The words are an act; the attitude sure ain't.

"C'mon in."

Dean sighs and drags his feet - still part of the act - so Sam walks in ahead of him. That boy breaks my heart. If I called him a thousand miles away and asked him to come help me find a screwdriver, he would. If I told him when he got here that the stupid thing was in the farthest corner of my property and I lost it there twenty years ago, he'd still look for it. If he thought it was important enough to me, he'd look until it was too dark to look anymore. He might think I was crazy, though he wouldn't say it to my face, but he'd do his best to help me.

Even now, with Dean acting pissed and walking slow, Sam takes a few long steps to get in front of me so he can open the door to the panic room for me. Because that's what he does, that's how he is. Polite, thoughtful, he cares about people. Demon blood be damned - that boy has a heart bigger than any I've ever known.

Which is why it breaks my heart what we have to do now.

And how we have to do it.

"Guys?" Sam asks as we close the door on him. Even now, he's got no clue. "Guys?" Even now we're the people he trusts and he'd accept any excuse we gave him if only we open that door.

That boy breaks my heart.

I hope he'll forgive me for breaking his.

the end


	3. A Winchester is Never Wrong

"I was wrong." Sam said.

Dean considered his options in answering. To ask '_about what?'_ could be taken as a snarky challenge, because God and His angels knew there was so much Sam could be considered wrong about. To say '_no you weren't'_ would be expedient but would be probably wrong, and would probably still ignite an argument from Sam.

They were at Bobby's. Dean couldn't be sure – okay, he _could_ be sure, they'd been here five days - but it felt like they'd been here their whole lives. They were safe here, safer than they'd be anywhere else, and there was still a panic room downstairs with Sam's name on it. Only this time if they had to put him there, it wouldn't be to keep him _in,_ it would be to keep hell _out _and away from him.

Dean just hadn't mentioned that to Sam. Yet

"Okay." Dean answered Sam's remark. He was sitting at the desk in Bobby's library, head in his hand, trying to read a book – _another book _- on the Apocalypse. Sam was standing in front of the desk. Dean tried to sound – neutral. He wasn't sure which way Sam's mood was headed.

"What I said, back at the motel, when I said you never trusted me, I was wrong."

"Okay." Dean tried again. This time he tried to sound – encouraging. Sam looked – well, as bad as he'd been looking all week. Tired. Wasted. Struggling. Wishing he could roll up and die and just have it over with. Dean wondered how long he'd been working on this little reveal of his.

"I was thinking, I remembered, do you remember when Dad was missing and we were in Jericho with the Woman in White and the cops arrested you at the motel? You remember what you said to me?"

"I'm pretty sure the word '_dammit'_ was part of it."

Sam either didn't hear Dean's attempt at humor or he was too far gone to care.

"You told me to find Dad. You trusted that I would find Dad. And when that demon was crashing planes and killing the survivors, I said we had to get on that plane and you trusted me enough to go even though you hate flying. In Florida, at the Mystery Spot, every day for a hundred days you just kept trusting me that something was wrong, even though you had absolutely no proof of it. You trusted me whenever I had a vision. You trusted me whenever I asked you to. You spent your whole life _trusting me._ So – what I said in that motel room – I was wrong."

Dean considered his options in answering _again._ To say '_well, duh, yeah'_ - while being very accurate wouldn't be very nice. It'd be too easy anyway; Sammy was wearing his '_go ahead, kick me'_ look right now.

"Oh, see when you said I never trusted you, I thought you meant _that day._" Dean said.

Sam's expression pulled in in puzzlement. Not the answer he was expecting apparently.

"_But I was wrong_." He kept trying.

"But I hadn't trusted you Sam. _That day. _So, you weren't wrong."

Sam took this in and mulled it over and his exhaustion and experience with Dean's sense of logic did him in for any more arguments. He opted for,

"You're an idiot."

"Ah – see there? _Now_ you're wrong." Dean said. "C'mon, pull up a couch and a book and let's get this battle underway."

"Yeah. Okay." Sam pulled a book from the unending pile and dropped himself on the couch.

"I was wrong." He said again.

"Didn't Dad teach you anything?" Dean asked. "Winchesters are never wrong – we simply make correction decisions based on faulty information."

That got a smile out of Sam and a soundless laugh.

"You're an idiot."

"I'm an idiot who's never wrong." Dean clarified. Sam was looking at him and Dean met his eyes and held the gaze. When Dean raised an eyebrow in an '_okay?'_ question, Sam nodded and turned his attention to the book in his lap. After a few minutes he said quietly,

"You're an idiot I trust. You know that, right?"

Dean smiled. As long as Sam kept that #1 in his mind, he'd never be wrong again.

"Yeah, I know that Sammy."

The end.


End file.
